Wilde--Salome

This is the first book-length study of Oscar Wilde's Salome, a play now regarded as central to his artistic achievement. Often drawing on little-known sources, the authors provide a detailed stage-history of this controversial work, and its transformation into opera, dance and film, with such major innovators as Max Reinhardt, Richard Strauss, Sergei Diaghilev, Peter Brook, Salvador Dali, Lindsay Kemp and Steven Berkhoff contributing to Salome's contemporary reputation. Beginning with Sarah Bernhardt's aborted production of 1892, the book surveys Salome's principal realisations in the European theatre, including Lugne-Poe's Parisian premiere of 1896, Reinhardt's Berlin productions of 1902-3, attempts at presentation in pre-revolutionary Russia and the play's impact on the English stage between 1911 and 1990.

A separate chapter explores a wealth of further interpretations, including Aubrey Beardsley's challenging illustrations, Strauss's operatic version, the exotic dances realised by Maud Allan and Ida Rubenstein and the provocative films by Alla Nazimova and Ken Russell. The book contains rare photographs and a list of productions.